Alireza Jafarzadeh, a former spokesman for the
opposition National Council of Resistance of Iran,
said Tehran was training fighters with light
weapons, mortars and the roadside bombs used to such
deadly effect against US troops.

"We're not talking about some rag-tag elements
and individuals who go out of their way and happen
to provide weapons or assistance to a number of
Shiite militia groups," Jafarzadeh told reporters in
New York.
"We are talking about systematic, well-organised,
high-level training officially provided by the
Iranian regime."

He said that militants who joined the camps --
alleged to be near Tehran and further south near
Jalilabad -- were trained either as special forces,
snipers or in the use of anti-aircraft missiles.

Jafarzadeh, who back in 2002 was among the first
to claim that Iran was intent on developing a
nuclear weapons program, said his information came
from well-placed sources inside Iran who could not
be identified.

He did not say how many people were believed to have
passed through the alleged camps, but said the
numbers were certainly in the thousands.

"This is the largest operation by any foreign entity
in Iraq. That is not limited to only money, it
includes explosives, arms, intelligence, all of
that," he said. He said his sources believed
that the vast majority of the militants were Iraqis
from the Shiite parts of Baghdad and the southern
provinces of Najaf, Karbala and Basra. He
alleged that one of Iraq's most powerful Shiite
leaders, Abdel Aziz Hakim, leader of the Supreme
Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI),
whose party sits in the Iraqi government, was
implicated.

"This operation involves a huge amount of
coordination, high-level coordination at the highest
level," he insisted.

Some of the militants allegedly entered Iran
disguised either as pilgrims or as people requiring
medical attention, while others either crossed the
border illegally or with visas issued by Iranian
officials in Iraq, he said.

Jafarzadeh stepped down as spokesman for the
National Council of Resistance of Iran in 2003. The
group is considered a front for the People's
Mujahedeen Organisation of Iran, which the United
States classes as a terrorist group.

The Iran Threat: President Ahmadinejad and the Coming Nuclear Crisis by
Alireza Jafarzadeh